Title: Masquerade

Chapter 3: Life is Fateful

"C'mon, Len! You're backing out now? After all the training we went through?"

"We… only played three games this year, Gumi-san," Len retorted, raising a blonde eyebrow. The green-haired girl was not pleased at all with his reasoning and her frown deepened, glaring eyes looking him up and down with her arms crossed authoritatively. The lopsided cap she wore over her goggles threatened to topple over when she tilted her head, as if considering the male's request. Aforementioned male tried his best not to roll his eyes at her grande show and held his tongue. After about three minutes of fidgeting, the team leader still hadn't deemed him worthy for a day off. While this endless shuffling of feet and chewing on cheek continued, Len was busy trying to reassure himself. C'mon, Len… Just a little more… She looks convinced. It's not a big game! She's finally noticing i—

"Denied." Crossing her arms to make a large 'X', she turned on her heel and began to walk off in the opposite direction, her short, green ponytail swishing from side to side like a proud horse's tail. Shocked, the blue-eyed boy just stood there, unable to move, feet rooted and gut anchored to the spot. Forcing himself out of his stupor, he pulled himself together, closed his gaping mouth and began to jog off after her, the whole while frantically trying to think of a good excuse, a reasonable excuse, any excuse.

"Gumi-san!" he called over just as he overtook her, skidding to a halt on the moist earth. He stood uncertainly in front of her path, arms held out, and very much intent on blocking her way until she agreed. If she agreed, the pessimist in his mind pointed out; he brushed it aside impatiently. "Please! Just this once! Gumi-san, I'm on my knees here!" Glancing down at the muddy ground and his brown-stained sneakers, he added, "Figuratively."

"Len! 'No' is 'no', is it so hard to understand that?" the older of the two sighed exasperatedly. She shoved her hands into the pockets of her jacket and rolled her eyes up to the sky. Len thought he saw a small white mist slip from her lips when she sighed; but when he blinked, it was gone. "This is our first match against those Higuchi school losers, we can't afford to lose any of our men now," she said, the whole time looking up at the white-grey sky and passing rainclouds.

"You won't lose me, Gumi-san," Len pressed with mutual exasperation, beyond desperate now. "I'm still here, I'm your batter but it's just that I won't—"

"Yes. 'You're my batter'," she said, raising her index finger at him as if scolding a five-year-old child. Len looked beyond the finger and at her face; her eyebrows were knitted together and the eyes underneath had a sort of dangerous shine to it. She was getting angry. Len never saw Gumi angry before; she was usually more… smiley. "And for as long as you're batter and I'm team leader, I still have control over whatever you do that's linked to baseball, understood?"

"But Gumi-san!" he retorted. How was he going to explain this to Kaito-senpai?

"No 'but's! C'mon, Len, what exactly is so important that you have to cancel Saturday's game? It's impossible for anything worth anything to suddenly pop up so last minute. What is this 'thing' you so desperately have to attend to?" Oh, she can see the desperation now?

Len opened his mouth to give her a very good explanation, which she simply could not refuse and possibly, would have the potential to strike her with guilt if she didn't let him skive Saturday's game. But he hesitated. Problem was that: he didn't have a good explanation. Because the poor lad had only thought of two plans: Plan A was to tell her that his cat just died, but Gumi just told him this morning that her cat died. She probably won't be buying any 'cat excuses' as of late. Wow, maybe that's why she's so PMS-y… Plan B was to tell her the truth, which – in many ways – would not end well. Why did he have to dress as Rin on Saturday in the first place? was the first question he could hear her asking and he cringed at the thought. No matter how close he was to his next-door neighbor-cum-baseball team leader, he simply couldn't tell her why he was so intent on cross-dressing as his twin sister.

Because he had absolutely no idea why he was doing it himself.

Defeated, he hung his head and didn't say a word. He could feel her probing eyes lingering on his head, and all the disappointment and frustration bubbling in his gut, pressing against his ribcage. This whole insane ordeal was an emotional roller-coaster from Day 1, and Len was beginning to wonder, why didn't he have a proper Plan B? Why had everything have to be decided from impulse?

Why did Kaito-senpai have to kiss him?

He saw Gumi's muddied sneakers move from where they were in front of him, out of his line of sight. The gradually fading sound of squelching mud was indication enough that the lime-haired girl didn't want to handle any more of his excuses. Len wished for something, anything to happen that would cancel the game. He clenched his left hand into a fist out of habit; he did it so tightly that his nails began to dig red, crescent-shaped indents into his palm. The pain, however, wasn't enough to snap him back to reality and make him walk out of the ball-park. Instead, a million and one 'what-if's flashed through his mind and about two million bad ways to break it to Kaito zoomed past at an equally frightening speed. Right now, he felt he could only do nothing as the rest of the world felt so… out of control. He sighed and closed his eyes tight.

He felt something slap against the top of his head and blinked as it rolled off his hair, down the side of his cheek, to drip off his chin. It was followed by another slap and another and soon, the rain was pelting the top of his blonde head and filling up the footprint-puddles on the vast field. Many people began shouting at each other, a few squealed at the cold water and most of the students began to laugh and guffaw as they ran for shelter. What sounded like a hundred squishy footsteps drowned out the sound of the rain beating against his head. He heard Gumi-san yell at the freshmen to pick up the bats before they got soaked. A few of his schoolmates bumped into him and he heard someone yell at him to run into the main building. But he remained where he was, simply lost of what to do.

Len tiredly glanced upwards at the grey sky and squinted his eyes when a raindrop landed on his eyebrow. The weatherman lied this morning… It was supposed to be a perfect day, he thought in disdain.


"Welcome back, welcome back! I hope you had a good trip! I saved some hot water for you!" Miku greeted him, pushing her smiling face up to his the moment he walked past the front door. Caught off-guard, Len took a few seconds to stare at her hopeful, glinting eyes and over-the-top smile before putting two and two together.

"What do you want, Miku?" Len murmured with a small grin as he pulled his feet out of his drenched sneakers. The rain had washed away most of the mud but his poor, white shoes were stained a light brown, which threatened to become permanent if he didn't do something soon. He groaned even more at his brown-stained socks and how spongy they felt against the floor.

"You mom told me to get the ingredients for tonight's dinner," he heard her continue as he kept his head bowed to the floor, fiddling with the bits of grass stuck to his socks.

"Mmm?" he nodded his head, tugging off his ruined socks, which slapped against the tiles and a large puddle of water seeped out onto the floor. He saw her feet shuffle about on the wooden panel above the now-wet tiles.

"And Rin's somewhat lonely…" she proceeded, starting to swing her left leg around.

"Un?"

"And I don't know what you usually put in a nabe…" Miku sounded somewhat embarrassed as she said this.

"Go on," the male was having fun bullying her.

"Could you?" Len was so tempted to ask her 'could I what?' but decided she had been tortured enough.

"Sure."

"Really?" Miku said in disbelief.

"Yeah, you keep Rin company," Len said, grinning up at her, holding up his drenched footwear. "After I clean myself up, I'll go get the stuff. Mom left the money on the table, right?" Also… I need a bit of alone-time to clear my head.

"Yeah…" she was still somewhat stunned by how nice he was being. But her smile quickly jumped back to life and she reached out her arms to hug him. But, seeing how wet he was, she lowered them, having reconsidered. "Thank you, Len! You're a lifesaver!" she cheered, punching her arm up into the air in an exaggerated victory-cheer. "I'll give you that hug when you're less… wet."

"Looking forward to it," he joked, stepping onto the wooden floor and heading up the stairs, his footsteps audibly – and wet-ly – slapping against the floor the entire time.


Len let his mind wander as he stood in the crowded supermarket line, a basket of groceries and junk food hanging from his right hand. It was so heavy that the slim plastic handle began to dig painfully into his palm. Cursing his luck, he could only hold on as he waited for his turn. The floor was streaked with moisture and grey dirt from outside. The thick scent of a rainy day remained clear in the air that slipped past the glass doors. The blonde was the only boy in line. Front and back, elderly women and the occasional baby flanked both ends. A strained sigh left his lips and he shuffled his feet. His shoes squeaked noisily against the wet floor.

Finally, it was his turn. With a relieved groan, the teen heaved the bright green basket onto the metal counter. The shop assistant smiled and scanned the groceries as well as the twenty stalks of leeks Miku told him to buy when he was about to leave the house.

"Would that be all?" the cashier asked in a cool voice and Len returned her smile half-heartedly.

"Yeah."


As he heaved the shopping bags along the crowded streets of the town, his ears were filled with car honks, the sound of shoes against wet pavement and pieces of conversation of people heading home. The casual exchanges soothed him somewhat and he felt himself calm down a little. He felt a lot cooler than he was during baseball practice and slowly began to wonder why he had stood in the rain all alone like that. Surely, he looked like an idiot! Shaking off the slight embarrassment, he bit on his lower lip. So wrapped up in his thoughts, Len didn't realise the end of a large stick coming right at him until he felt the back of his elbow suddenly colliding with it. A tingling shockwave ran down to his hand and up his arm from a direct hit to his funny bone and the plastic bag that he was holding fell from his grasp. Cursing his luck, he watched in horror as the packets of tofu belly-flopped onto the wet pavement, strewn across the concrete along with the other things that were in the bag. He immediately got onto his knees and began to salvage what he could.

"I'm so sorry, let me help," he heard the person that had bumped into him apologise. Out of the corner of his eye, Len saw the 'someone' get on his knees as well. The blonde was somewhat grateful yet still a bit agitated at the same time and kept his eyes trained on his part of the sidewalk, keen on getting all the stuff in the bag and going home. Once most of the fallen groceries were back in the bag, Len was grateful that a large number of them were wrapped in plastic. He sighed in relief before realising that it had stopped raining.

"Here," the last item, a box of Pocky, was handed to him and Len glanced at it for a second before nodding politely and accepting it. He paused, hand barely holding onto the box when he spotted the blue nailpolish on that hand that offered it to him.

He looked up in shock and heard the box fall with a soft clatter. "Shion… senpai…"

(A/N: Hello, my darlings! I know it's been awhile since my last update, and I'm so sorry. But you all would be happy to know that the exams are over. lol. It took me awhile to write this, I apologise for that, but watching anime did somehow help. I'm not really sure how, though. =.=; Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this chapter and lotsa lurves to you all, my readers. You all are my greatest inspiration. –heart-

Glossary

'The weatherman lied' – Another reference to Melt. I just love this song. =)

Tiled floor and wooden floor at the entrance – In Japanese homes, it is necessary to remove one's shoes before entering and usually, at the front door of a Japanese home, there is a small square of floor which is tiled where the shoe-rack is. Near that tiled floor, the rest of the house is raised about an inch or two in relation to the tiled floor and usually, the raised floor is wooden. This is for cleanliness. Also, since the wooden-floor bit is raised, a person going out can always sit on the wooden part while they put on their shoes. I hope that makes sense.

nabe – Japanese hotpot. It's when you put a pot in the middle of a table and (depending on what kind of nabe you're doing) it is heated either electrically or by a small, controlled flame (usually some sort of petroleum jelly). A broth is poured in and an array of vegetables, meat, seafood and tofu is put in. The selection is usually depending on the type of broth and what the group eating said nabe likes.

Pocky – I'm sure most of you know what this is. A pocky is basically a famous Japanese snack which is a slim biscuit-stick with about one-fifth of it covered in some sort of hardened, flavoured cream. The most common Pocky is the chocolate Pocky.

Nail polish – Most of you should know this but, as odd as this sounds, Vocaloids seem to colour their nails depending on their colour theme, which is usually their hair colour as well. The only Vocaloid that doesn't seem to colour their nails according to their hair colour is Luka, who has pink hair but light blue nail polish. Not so sure why this is so but her eyes are light blue, so yeah...

Thank you so much for reading and remember: review, fave and alert. –heart-)